Funeral - family flowers only but...

shazronnie

When we go to a funeral we give a cheque but leave the name blank, we dont mind if the money goes to the chosen charity and deffinately wont be offended if it went into their own bank. Funerals are sooo expensive!
And florists are rob dogs!! £35 per letter on the flower messages..£175 daddy!!

pelirocco

doelani wrote: »

Things have changed so much with funerals, you were not critical lol

When my mum died we had family flowers only , one from children and one from grandchildren and asked donations for charity.

My mum though herself was different , no matter who died if family or a friend she bought flowers and if donations for charity were asked for she thought this was so wrong, bless her bet she was turning in her grave when she only got 2 lots.

Why didnt you respect her wishes?
I do think flowers are a waste of money , but they are very comforting in one way , we recently had to organise my mil funeral , she loved flowers and having masses of flowers at the graveside was lovely

miss_edith

shazronnie wrote: »

And florists are rob dogs!! £35 per letter on the flower messages..£175 daddy!!

:rotfl: Try producing one yourself to the same standard. Then you can come on here and insult people. :rolleyes:

Person_one

miss_edith wrote: »

:rotfl: Try producing one yourself to the same standard. Then you can come on here and insult people. :rolleyes:

When my friend died, another friend's mum made a beautiful flower arrangement, nicer than lots of the professional ones and she'd only ever done an evening class years ago! She only asked for £10 for the flowers themselves, possibly they cost her more than that. She isn't running a business though and doesn't have to worry about paying staff, rates etc.

Even if the family aren't in dire straits, they've lost a wage earner. They may be ok at first but bills, mortgage etc will start to get harder, they may have to move, possibly the elder children will have less support going through college etc. Death hits families very hard financially and at least they have specified that the money is for the children.

rach29

miss_edith wrote: »

:rotfl: Try producing one yourself to the same standard. Then you can come on here and insult people. :rolleyes:

I'm sorry you feel insulted but the actual cost of producing those letters is no more than £10 a letter (according to my florist friend) so £35 a letter is extortion. I'm all for business people making a FAIR profit.

doelani

pelirocco wrote: »

Why didnt you respect her wishes?

For a few reasons,

We ( my brother and myself ) paid £200 for 2 large arrangements from family. Many of our family could not afford to pay for flowers and we did not want to make people feel they HAD to buy flowers. We also believed that donations to the orginisation that helps but suffers and familys of mums illness was better.

Both my husband and myself have told family we do not want laods of flowers at ours.

Person_one

doelani wrote: »

For a few reasons,

We ( my brother and myself ) paid £200 for 2 large arrangements from family. Many of our family could not afford to pay for flowers and we did not want to make people feel they HAD to buy flowers. We also believed that donations to the orginisation that helps but suffers and familys of mums illness was better.

Both my husband and myself have told family we do not want laods of flowers at ours.

I think you were fine to do this. Your mum never knew what her funeral was like and its the ones left behind who have to consider the practicalities. An elderly relative of mine had all sorts of outlandish demands for his funeral but had made no provision to pay for it. Funerals are for the living mourners, not the person who has died and unless there's some major ethical or religious issue I think its fine to do things differently than they might have preferred.

newcook

rach29 wrote: »

I'm sorry you feel insulted but the actual cost of producing those letters is no more than £10 a letter (according to my florist friend) so £35 a letter is extortion. I'm all for business people making a FAIR profit.

while I also think they are expensive, you also have to take into consideration the time it takes for the florist to do each letter plus the costs of premises, delivery etc.

its the cost of a funeral boquet that shocks me! my boss recently asked me to order one from interflora - £55!!!!! it wasnt even a huge/complicated looking one!!!

mpython

My wife passed away last year and we had family flowers (actually done by my wife's best friends) and donations to charity.

In terms of financial support,even if the husband wasn't in a decent pension scheme/ made their own arrangements for their kids, nor had any life insurance, the spouse would be entitled to £2k bereavement grant and ongoing widowed parents allowance, as well as pre-exisiting child benefit. Depending on her circumstances, she might become entitled to income support and other benefits.

At the end of the day, a donation is just that, a donation, entirely up to you if you want to give or not. I did not begrudge a single person who didn't tell me they had made a donation (they may have, they may not have), or had brought flowers. I was just very grateful for the support from everyone at the time.

You can always give to a relevant charity instead if you prefer.

delain

I think it's a great idea that the money that would have gone on flowers goes to the kids.

I'd hate to see my family go without, my bank account has £15,000 accidental death cover (I'm 25 so not likely to get ill, I hope!) and my family has been told I want to be an organ donor, and a cheap cremation and whats left to be put into savings for my kids to go to uni, etc should anything happen to me.